Submitted by the Bedford Historical Society
More than a century since the American chestnut tree – which comprised one-quarter of all American hardwood forests — deteriorated from a lethal fungus disease called chestnut blight, the trees are being restored through the efforts of the American Chestnut Foundation (ACF).
As guest speaker for the Bedford Historical Society’s March lecture series, wildlife biologist and ACF volunteer Curt Laffin will trace the history of this significant tree and the Foundation’s work to return it to our forests. Laffin became intrigued by the loss of this beloved tree when, at the age of 5, his father showed him one of the last surviving American chestnut trees, in Harvard, MA.
The event will begin at 7:15 pm on Wednesday, March 23rd in Upper Fellowship Hall of the First Church of Christ, Congregational, 25 The Great Rd., with refreshments and a social period. After brief announcements around 7:45 pm, Laffin will begin his slide presentation and provide a cross-section of an American chestnut for the audience to view and touch.
This program is free and open to the public.
Laffin will describe how the blight, imported to the US on Asian chestnut trees, is a fungus whose spores are easily dispersed by air, raindrops or animals. The fungus enters the chestnut tree via injuries in the tree’s bark and then spreads throughout the tree, killing wood and cambium tissues as it advances. Because the cambium portion of the tree are cells responsible for secondary growth in stems and roots, the blight chokes off the flow of nutrients to the tree, leaving it as a sprouts on a short-lived tree stump.
After years of research and testing, the ACF has been successful using a method of plant breeding called “backcrossing” to incorporate blight-resistance into this beloved species, and the Foundation harvested the first potentially blight-resistant American chestnuts in 2005.
According to Laffin, the American Chestnut Foundation wants to return the American chestnut “to its former niche in the Appalachian hardwood forest ecosystem.” The Foundation describes its restoration project as a “major, multi-faceted effort involving 6,000 members and volunteers, research, sustained funding and most important, a sense of the past and a hope for the future.”
Retired from the US Fish and Wildlife Service, Curt Laffin has volunteered for 10 years as a speaker for the American Chestnut Foundation, giving talks throughout New England. He also is a volunteer for the Merrimack River Watershed Council.
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